


Shadow of the Bear

by Whuffie



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: Drabble, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 11:21:06
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1093298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whuffie/pseuds/Whuffie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Short drabble about what Nathaniel might have been like in his late teens, before Rendon sent him to the Free Marches.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shadow of the Bear

Nathaniel sat beneath the bear emblem, cross legged and fitting the smith’s arrowheads into fresh shafts which he’d labored to straighten. The glue was made by his own hands and feathers gathered with a sharp eye which served his chosen pursuit of skills well. A Howe learned to be resourceful and independent. It was a lesson he learned on his own, early in his life, but there were times he worried he’d become too strong willed or outspoken. The intrusive concern was particularly bad when he suspected his father was making future arrangements for him, and wanted a meek, obedient son who did as he was told. Nathaniel wasn’t always as good at that as he wanted to be, but was a grown man, now. While Rendon had been making plans for the sibling as a hopeful match to the Couslands, he hadn’t been trying to drive any similar ambitions into Nathaniel. Perhaps he planned on passing the Arling to him, eventually? That idea made the young man’s guts squirm unpleasantly, but he was sure he could do it. He could do anything.

He was a Howe.

The family crest loomed behind him on the wall of his bedroom, vigilant and powerful as the lamp light flickered to make it cast a dancing shadow. A bear was appropriate for the Howe family, and Nathaniel set his shoulders back with pride, sitting up straighter. It didn’t matter there was no one to see, and he carefully set his arrow in front of the fire to dry, out of the reach from sparks. Like his father, Nathaniel was skilled in stealth, speed, and he was smarter than his brother, Thomas. When Thom wasn’t paddling around in drink, usually vomiting on someone’s shoes, he was a well versed warrior. As a Howe, Nathaniel always thought Thom should have made a more concentrated effort at upholding their family name rather than letting people see he couldn’t unclutch his fingers from the neck of an ale bottle. They were family, however. Nathaniel would have said he loved Thom and Delilah had he been asked. In reality, he clung fiercely to duty, family honor, and pride. All served as replacements for affection in an aloof mother and a father whose flaws the stripling Howe refused to see in his patriarch. Every day, the younger rogue struggled to show improvement to his mother’s critical, disdainful eye when she was alive, or to gain a grain of approval from his father’s cunning gaze. Rendon gave out praise sparingly, making it a worthy goal.

The son had listened to all his tutors as he was given an education to stretch his mind, and hardened his muscles with daily training to achieve the lithe fighting style his father used. The only thing which troubled him was Rendon’s penchant for using two weapons, and no matter how hard he tried to emulate the flashing blades, Nathaniel was more comfortable with a bow. As a lethal marksman, there wasn’t anyone in Amaranthine who was a better shot than he was, and he thought he could put a man’s life out through the eye slit of a helm at many paces if he tried it. He hadn’t the opportunity to put that speculation to the test, yet, but he was sure that he would, eventually. When he did, he’d be the best there was, and restore the expression of pride in his sire’s eye, perhaps even earn the reward of a few spared words of praise.

Unfolding his legs to gracefully stand up, the young rogue collected arrows which he had made earlier in the week, and slid them carefully into a quiver. Shrugging it onto his shoulder, he welcomed the familiar feel of his bow into hand, and slid an archer’s glove on his opposite for daily practice. He had just recently passed nineteen, and found himself again wondering what his father had planned for him. Nathaniel had a thick dust of stubble, and had long since grown out of the gawky, awkward, scarecrow limbs of a boy. It was past time that he knew the plans which would shape the rest of his life. Perhaps after leaving the field and cleaning up, he would arrange an appointment with his father to discuss it.

Striding out to the open practice yards with all the imperious arrogance a man his age could cram in his lanky body, he wondered who would be there, and if any of them would give him decent competition. Some of the younger boys were afraid to try their hardest because he was the son of the Arl, but the older veterans didn’t spare him hard knocks which he deserved for being too slow. It was the only way for him to learn correctly, and he was disappointed to see there was only a lone girl — woman he supposed, although just barely — hacking at a practice dummy with the familiar fluidity of twin blades. He frowned to himself, and tied his growing hair back into a loose tail behind his head. She wasn’t his father, but she had some skill. It might behoove him to see if he could learn a little from her, provided she actually kept trying with him the way she did with the dummy.

“Do you want to practice together?” He’d been versed in all the courtly manners, particularly around the Couslands because of the Teyrn, but this was the yard. He wasn’t there to ask for the kind of dance which meant polished boots and swishing skirts, and she agreed.

Good. He needed either exercise to to challenge her arrogance to think she was better than a Howe unless she had the skill to stand behind the belief.


End file.
